Welcome to Style / Substance, a newsletter about personal style, confidence, and the psychology of fashion. Features include outfit ideas, styling & clothing care tips, reflections on how style can transform you, and product/brand recommendations to make your life easier and ensure you present your best self.
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Happy Women’s History Month!
Recently, I was asked to share a “case study” regarding a big win for a styling client. What came to mind was not the story of one client but rather all of my clients. It’s the story of my friends, of myself. Your story. It’s that magical moment when you put on the dress or the blazer, and your body language changes; you stand up taller, you sigh and release the tension and air you were holding onto, you unclench your jaw (and other body parts), and you smile. Because the clothes fit your body and they fit you; your personality, your individuality, your lifestyle. And because you have clarity and efficiency around your choices in your closet.
This moment when it clicks is a motivator in my work. I love watching someone’s non-verbals play out right in front of me. It’s a treasured sight. To experience this, you must let go of something: what we commonly know as “pain points.” They come in all metaphorical, psychological, and physiological shapes, personal narratives, and moments (fleeting and underlying) of uncertainty or stress. To mitigate, the resolution must come from within for it to be effective. This is a very seeing (and feeling) is believing kind of perspective. It works.
I have the privilege of helping people find solutions in an area of life that has the power on the surface to assuage beneath it and discover beyond it. Today, I’m sharing two stories of women and their personal styles where pain points were identified and how we worked through them together. Names and some details are changed to respect privacy, and the stories have been condensed.
The first story starts in the air.
Let me begin by painting a picture. Maya, an entrepreneur, launched a business a few years ago. She reached out to me during her Series A funding round. Her goal was to be polished and represent her new company—in consumer packaged goods—and to be taken seriously by investors when pitching for capital while also feeling like herself, meaning no business suits. It’s worth noting that this is a complex space, particularly because a disproportionately low share of Venture Capital funding is invested in all-female-founded companies (around 2%). Insert Maya and her co-founders.
Keeping the immediate audience in mind, we developed outfits within her current clothing collection and began to incorporate a few elevated tops and blouses that she could wear for video and in-person meetings. Most of these pieces were in neutral, solid colors to not distract from the content of the pitch decks and the greater objectives. They were also slightly feminine, representing Maya’s personality and preferences. We emphasized this element of her aesthetic as she didn’t want to wear a costume and not feel like herself. Striking a balance between her comfort level and reading the rooms she was entering (mostly full of men). With that, we captured images of these looks (for her “lookbook”) that she could reference so she was prepared before any scheduled or fairly last-minute meeting.
But fashion emergencies still happen, even with planning. Maya texted me SOS one afternoon while she was flying to NYC to meet with a VC. Her white blouse had a giant blue ink stain on the sleeve, the size of a golf ball. She didn’t know how it happened or when, but as she was typing away on her laptop midair, she saw it and immediately panicked. This was a same-day trip for her. What she had on was what she was to wear for the meeting.
Now, a pen mark on clothing may seem like nothing to you, but this blue spot is amplified in a high-stakes moment. For Maya, this stain was her stress manifesting in the magnification of her attire, which we had worked previously to mitigate. We can’t account for posed environmental factors in everything.
A few things happened in the ensuing message exchanges. I asked her arrival time at what airport and the timing and location where her meeting would occur. There was a two-and-a-half-hour window between landing and the meeting's start, with a 45-minute expected transit from LaGuardia Airport to Union Square in Manhattan, where she was headed. I got on the phone with a few stores within a 10-block radius of her meeting address while simultaneously looking at their online assortment of styles.
After some web link exchanges, feeling out Maya’s interest in tops at Madewell online, and closely trying to coordinate a new style that fairly mimicked her current “unwearable” top and what was within her budget, I spoke with the store manager at their 5th and 20th Street location and requested a few tops in her size to be pulled. Gave them her name and anticipated arrival time.
Maya made it to the store and swiftly tried on the pieces we had virtually pre-selected. Chose one that fit, looked great with the rest of her look, and felt like her. Texted me with a mirror photo confirmation that she was good to go. Phew! She even bought a few other pieces (since she was there and they were readily available for her to try on) and walked out the door in the new top and into the meeting with the returned confidence she felt as she boarded her plane earlier in the day.
The second story starts on a call.
For background, Emily is a mom of three who works inside the home. She manages demanding family schedules, volunteers, has an engaged community and social life, and frequently travels with her husband on work trips, among other activities and responsibilities. The moment Emily reached out for help with her closet came after she realized how much of what she wore daily impacted her negatively and many of her experiences, most specifically, her youngest son’s recent high school graduation.
We met virtually since Emily lives in Seattle—this was our first Zoom and the beginning of our work together. Whether in person or remote, I have a series of questions I ask a new client as we begin a session that does two things: 1. Helps them get comfortable with me quickly, establishes trust, respect, and the space for clients to share their challenges, vulnerabilities, and get into the specifics; 2. Aims to help them slow down, identify, and verbalize how they are feeling, in their body and emotionally, at the very moment of the session so that I can respond to their immediate state with empathy and have context for the time we’re about to spend together.
Thankfully, Emily felt comfortable enough to share what happened at her son’s graduation as soon as we exchanged the initial Q&A. Thinking that she had something in her closet that she could reach for the morning of the big day, she ended up trying on seven dresses. None of them fit right or felt right for the occasion. Leading up to this day, she didn’t buy a new dress because, on the one hand, she “wasn’t feeling great in her body" and didn’t want to spend money on something new. On the other hand, she had hoped that something would just fit and frankly didn’t want to address the old dresses that weren’t serving here. But it was too late. She had to put on the best of the bunch from the seven that were staring at her in her closet.
She zipped up the dress, slipped on her shoes, and walked out the door. During the ceremony, much of what she thought about was how uncomfortable she was, how tight the dress fit, and how much people were probably judging her for such ill-fitting clothing. The icing on the cake: this somehow signaled that she didn’t put considerate thought into what to wear for this special day, as a result making her a “bad mom.” Her self-critical voice was kicking into overdrive. But this isn’t even where she felt the worst. Later that day, when they were home, and she changed back into something more comfortable, the shame she felt for letting these thoughts consume her and take her attention away from the main focus of the day—her son and his graduation—was overwhelming.
Let me further emphasize the emotional pull. This is her youngest child, her older sons are in college, meaning she and her husband were gearing up to be “empty nesters” in the coming months. This is important to note because these underlying life changes and transitions, as you know, come with big emotions. The compounding effect of “having nothing to wear” in these kinds of big life moments becomes magnified and is a common reason why I get the call.
Emily was fed up. She was fed up with disliking what was in her closet. She was fed up with not knowing how to put clothing together. She was fed up with being uncertain of what the right fit and aesthetic was appropriate for her age, body, and life. She was fed up with being so fed up about it all. The graduation dress was the pain point that broke this all.
After she shared this experience on our call, we continued to edit her closet virtually and, in the following months, began to build out a wardrobe that was right for her. Knowing what Emily’s day-to-day and regular trips looked like, we built out a versatile and effective closet that she could reach for when regular life moments came up. She went on a girls’ weekend trip and packed based on all the looks we created—didn’t buy anything new and had all that she needed in her closet for a three-day getaway. Because of this, her attention was focused entirely on her quality visit with her friends, her solo time, and not on what she was wearing.
You may or may not be raising capital or kids, but these stories are of women who want to feel amazing, have the solutions readily available, get dressed efficiently, and know that they are showing up in all areas of their lives as themselves, not in something that they previously felt dictated to wear or assumed was “right.” Ultimately allowing themselves to be present.
This applies to you. Not just these women. All women. All of us.
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Quick Quinoa Bowl
Say that three times fast!
I sometimes find myself standing in front of the pantry or fridge during the week with complete decision paralysis on what to reach for. I realize that with a little planning, I can swing some pretty tasty and quick meals that I am willing to eat breakfast, noon, and night that don’t bog me down, especially in the middle of the day. My latest is this quinoa salad - it’s super simple, flavorful, and filling.
Recipe & Method
Quinoa - you can buy it pre-cooked or not / any color is fine
Blueberries
Feta - crumbled
Almonds - I do slivered, blanched are recommended
Scallions - sliced thin
Olive oil
Salt & Pepper - to your liking
Mix it all together - just be sure the quinoa is double the ratio to all the other ingredients, and maybe go light on the scallions if you want to include them. Enjoy!
🎧 Latest Pod Interview on Style
Have you ever noticed how you feel when you're wearing something you love vs. when you're wearing something you just threw on? Your wardrobe choices have a bigger impact on how you see yourself and how you show up in the world than you might think. I chatted with Michelle Gauthier recently about the impact of clothing and getting dressed on your day. I hope you’ll give it a listen!
Such great examples of why what we wear matters! Great work ❤️